Thoughts

A return visit to Zeyer

The captain said, “Buckle your seat belts.”  The ride was about to get bumpy.

Zeyer Lutheran Church in the early 1900’s

It was the 22nd of July 2013 and I was on a small commuter flight returning from my parent’s house, going to my connecting flight in Dulles. The clouds outside were billowing hugely.  The flight staff was told to take their seats; everyone was told to buckle in and prepare for a bumpy ride.

I looked out my window into an ocean of total white as we dove into a massive cloud bank. I stared out my window, my mind felt strangely focused and saw, not clouds, but rather…

“Dark. Cold. Snow.  A few lights glinting along the horizon.

I stand at the door and look over the fields.  The Foellmer’s house is dark.  It is silent. There is little wind. It is quiet, still.

A tracer, there are tracers! A flash. Shrill whistles. Explosions. Earth and snow everywhere in the air.  The Foellmer’s house stands; down the road there are fires.  Many fires. Screaming, pain, shouts. Explosions.

The smell, the dust, the water, the noise.

Hordes of people running. The road is full of people screaming, running, injured, falling, crying. Flashes, explosions, dirt, debris. People jump into the Strom rushing to escape. Water spouts up into the air.

Dogs barking… cows crying; streaks across the sky.

The ground rumbles, shakes. A limb falls from the old tree out front.

Screams.  German… Russian.  Screams.  Horses and cavalry run.”

I do not know where this ‘visit’ came from;  I do not know what promoted its appearance.  Perhaps it is as Shakespeare wrote:

There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio,
Than are dreamt of in your philosophy.

Hamlet, scene v

ManyRoads Creator, Professional Genealogist, Family Historian, ManyRoads Podcast co-host, Old Guy and most importantly 'opa'